Well, if you just plan to run down the coast a ways and use sailmail or
check in with the local nets you probably don't need to learn much. But if
you are half way to Hawaii and the "eathers" are not right you need to know
some about propagation in order to choose a good frequency. There are also
several knobs on that black box that can either screw up your signal or make
it clear so it is better to know what effect each has and how to use it.

A good bit, if not the majority, of the tests these days is about safety and
the rules that try to prevent the bands from becoming totally chaotic.
Compared to 40 years ago when you pretty well had to know how to build a
transmitter out of bailing wire and cow patties the technical part these
days is laughable. The only hard part is memorizing the band frequencies.

Ham radio is more than a utility. I realize that building boats on the
scale that we are turns us into a sort of hermit but sitting out an off
season in some foreign anchorage it can become a center of your social life.

--
Glenn Ashmore

I'm building a 45' cutter in strip/composite. Watch my progress (or lack
there of) at: http://www.rutuonline.com
Shameless Commercial Division: http://www.spade-anchor-us.com

"Lew Hodgett" wrote in message
ink.net...
Gene Kearns wrote:

Hmmmmm...... well, I'm not sure I'm ready to jump on the "good for ham
radio" bandwagon. Maybe it will eventually interest some more
qualified people.... that would be good, I think. If anybody wishes to
make the.... argument that the test is too *hard,* well, I just went
deaf. However, I *am* willing to listen to those people that aren't
wishing to make things easier (because it's just too hard), but want
the test to be more about what they intend to *do* with Amateur Radio.

A couple of questions.

My only interest in HAM radio is to be able to get necessary weather
forecasts and communicate with other sailors who happen to be in my net at
the moment, when I'm at sea or in an anchorage.

I choose not to want to open up the box and play with what's inside.

I choose not to design and build radio equipment.

I quit building Heath Kits more than 30 years ago.

I think of HAM radio as nothing more than a utility, like electricity or
water or sewers.

If I have to stop and review operational procedures every time I turn it
on, it becomes a bigger PITA than it is worth.

Given all of the above, what are my best options?

Lew

Geoff --


"Geoff Schultz" wrote in message
6...
"Gerald" wrote in
:

Worthy of note --- not much of
that communications technology did anyone much good around ground zero
on 9-11 of the hurricanes in Florida last year, or ... pick your
disaster. Cell phone service was pretty much crippled on the east
coast (entire country???) on 9-11. Ham radio kept on ticking...

[Lots of clipping from the above post]

So what did morse code have to do with the above?

Absolutly nothing. Just a litttle "pro ham radio" note.

How much of the
communication during the hurricane(s) was code vs voice? I can guess that
it was probably close to 100% voice. I would also point out that cell
service was disrupted in the immediate area around the 911 disaster, but
the rest of the country wasn't effected, other than perhaps overloaded
circuits.

And the differnece bwtween overloaded circuits and any other disruption
when you need to get a call through and cann't is......?

Q: How did the reports from the hijacked plane that crashed into
the field come in? A: Cell phones.

And your point is??????

I think we are loosing some sense of where this thread came from and is
about.

-- Geoff

"Lew Hodgett" wrote in message
ink.net...

A couple of questions.

My only interest in HAM radio is to be able to get necessary weather
forecasts and communicate with other sailors who happen to be in my net at
the moment, when I'm at sea or in an anchorage.

SNIP

Given all of the above, what are my best options?

Lew

If the "other sailors who happen to be in my net" include Ham operators,
then the answer is obvious, get a license. Otherwise Marine SSB offers
various nets for cruisers. If you cruise the east coast/ Bahamas - there is
the Cruiseheimers Net every morning at 8:30 local with much of the same
information (and people) as on the Waterway Cruising Net (Hams at 7:45).
You are free to listen to the Ham nets with out a license. In an emergency,
you can do what you need to do. Many mariners will meet up on Cruisheimers
(Marine SSB) and establish other smaller nets / get togethers on other
Marine SSB channels.

Sailmail (as well as other commercial services) is an excellent way to get
PACTOR email and weather. Obviously, and decent HF receiver will get you
access to the USCG WEFAX data.

OCENS (and many others) provides software to get this HF data as well as
download sat weather images (hardware obviously costs...images are free).
OCENS also provides a highly optimized format of may of the standard weather
charts for efficient download over cell phone or Sat Phone.

VHF weather from NOAA in the US and various helpful people throughout the
Bahamas.

Herb Hilgenberg (http://www3.sympatico.ca/hehilgen/vax498.htm) on marine SSB
is probably the best weather source available for mariners on the Atlantic.
There is always information pertaining to the Bahamas / Bahamas crossing
during season.

Depending on where you are, Marine VHF is the means of communicating between
boats with in VHF range of each other. Other than on HAM nets, I don't hear
a lot of HAMs communicating boat-to-boat ---- Not that it doesn't happen,
just not the regular local gab line.

If traveling within 25 miles of the coast, a No-Code license will get you
access to all the Hams / Ham repeaters along your route. I find this useful
for local restaurant recommendations.

You have many options if you have decided that you don't want to learn code.
HF HAM is the only one you have opted out of.

Glenn Ashmore wrote:
Well, if you just plan to run down the coast a ways and use sailmail or
check in with the local nets you probably don't need to learn much. But if
you are half way to Hawaii and the "eathers" are not right you need to know
some about propagation in order to choose a good frequency. There are also
several knobs on that black box that can either screw up your signal or make
it clear so it is better to know what effect each has and how to use it.

A good bit, if not the majority, of the tests these days is about safety and
the rules that try to prevent the bands from becoming totally chaotic.
Compared to 40 years ago when you pretty well had to know how to build a
transmitter out of bailing wire and cow patties the technical part these
days is laughable. The only hard part is memorizing the band frequencies.

Ham radio is more than a utility. I realize that building boats on the
scale that we are turns us into a sort of hermit but sitting out an off
season in some foreign anchorage it can become a center of your social life.



Granted my question was a little tongue in cheek, but it has been a slow
day at the boat yard. (90+F tends to restrict your glass laying schedule).

Along the same "time marches on" theme, it has been announced that the
USN will cease using paper charts. Conversion to be complete in this decade.

That one will be interestingG.

Lew

"Lew Hodgett" wrote Along the same "time
marches on" theme, it has been announced that the
USN will cease using paper charts. Conversion to be complete in this
decade.

That one will be interestingG.


Yeah, but they are running Linux on $100K computers. Are you ready to trust
your life to Bill Gates and Gateway? :-)

--
Glenn Ashmore

I'm building a 45' cutter in strip/composite. Watch my progress (or lack
there of) at: http://www.rutuonline.com
Shameless Commercial Division: http://www.spade-anchor-us.com

"Glenn Ashmore" wrote in
news:Xk4Le.17506$Ie.6745@lakeread03:

"Lew Hodgett" wrote Along the same "time
marches on" theme, it has been announced that the
USN will cease using paper charts. Conversion to be complete in this
decade.

That one will be interestingG.


Yeah, but they are running Linux on $100K computers. Are you ready to
trust your life to Bill Gates and Gateway? :-)

Who's running on a $100K computer? Even the shuttle astronauts are running
laptops, which happen to be IBM ThinkPad 760XD specially modified for use
in space. The 760XD uses a 166MHz Pentium with 64MB RAM, and a 3.0 GB
removable hard drive. They run Windows 95.

See: http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewnews.html?id=213

And yes, I would trust Windows...

-- Geoff

"Geoff Schultz" wrote in message
6...
"Glenn Ashmore" wrote in
news:Xk4Le.17506$Ie.6745@lakeread03:

"Lew Hodgett" wrote Along the same "time
marches on" theme, it has been announced that the
USN will cease using paper charts. Conversion to be complete in this
decade.

That one will be interestingG.


Yeah, but they are running Linux on $100K computers. Are you ready to
trust your life to Bill Gates and Gateway? :-)

Who's running on a $100K computer? Even the shuttle astronauts are
running
laptops, which happen to be IBM ThinkPad 760XD specially modified for use
in space. The 760XD uses a 166MHz Pentium with 64MB RAM, and a 3.0 GB
removable hard drive. They run Windows 95.

See: http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewnews.html?id=213

And yes, I would trust Windows...

-- Geoff

They might use laptops for some of their work but the computers flying the
shuttle are rather different. According to a book I read some time ago
these little boxes (there were 4 of them originally and I guess this has not
changed) were built to be bullet-proof. The code was written by IBM and
every one of the 100,000 plus lines was verified more than once. The book
said it was some of the most expensive code ever written.

Geoff Schultz wrote:

And yes, I would trust Windows...
-- Geoff

then you're clueless

"Gordon Wedman" wrote in
news:OoaLe.175420$9A2.145434@edtnps89:


"Geoff Schultz" wrote in message
6...
"Glenn Ashmore" wrote in
news:Xk4Le.17506$Ie.6745@lakeread03:

"Lew Hodgett" wrote Along the same
"time marches on" theme, it has been announced that the
USN will cease using paper charts. Conversion to be complete in
this decade.

That one will be interestingG.


Yeah, but they are running Linux on $100K computers. Are you ready
to trust your life to Bill Gates and Gateway? :-)

Who's running on a $100K computer? Even the shuttle astronauts are
running
laptops, which happen to be IBM ThinkPad 760XD specially modified for
use in space. The 760XD uses a 166MHz Pentium with 64MB RAM, and a
3.0 GB removable hard drive. They run Windows 95.

See: http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewnews.html?id=213

And yes, I would trust Windows...

-- Geoff

They might use laptops for some of their work but the computers flying
the shuttle are rather different. According to a book I read some
time ago these little boxes (there were 4 of them originally and I
guess this has not changed) were built to be bullet-proof. The code
was written by IBM and every one of the 100,000 plus lines was
verified more than once. The book said it was some of the most
expensive code ever written.

I wasn't trying to imply that the main computers which control the
shuttle (which are 4x redundant) ran Windows! I know full well that
those systems probably cost millions. But one has to consider that the
laptops which the shuttle astronauts use are Windows based.

My Northstar 961 chartplotter is based upon Windows NT. It's extremely
stable.

I built my first computer (SWTPC 6800) in 1974 from chips. I've spent
20+ years in the software industry of which 5 were spent in DEC's fault
tolerant group where I implemented systems with 99.999% uptime. That
group later went on to form Marathon Technolgies
http://www.marathontechnologies.com/ which based their solutions on
Windows platforms and provides 99.999% uptime. You'll find that the
vast majority of crashes are caused by I/O system synchronization
problems. The next time that you say "OK" to the fact that the drivers
haven't been certified by MicroSoft, maybe you should realize that this
may be a major contributor to the stability of your system.

So yes, people can throw stones at Microsoft, but often they really
don't understand many of the underlying issues. Please, let's not make
this a religious war and go back to the topic at hand...FCC and code
requirements.

-- Geoff

prodigal1 wrote in :

Geoff Schultz wrote:

And yes, I would trust Windows...
-- Geoff

then you're clueless

And your momma wears combat boots. Thanks for providing the enlightening
commentary.

-- Geoff